Final Reflection

I have really enjoyed being an intern at the Arizona Museum for Youth. I had the opportunity to work with the people behind the scenes that patrons don't usually get to see. One particular experience was to take part in the setting-up of an exhibit. Everyone helps in different aspects, and I was able to work on the artwork's labels, see how they were done, and then to create the children's activites.

I feel that I have really grown with this opportunity! When I started, I had NO CLUE how to create a manual for anything and I was very worried and not looking forward to reading EVERYTHING about the museum and then what would I do from there? But after MANY, MANY hours of reading and meeting with multiple people, and then designing the layout, I produced a very successful manual for a "one stop shopping" for the Educators.

I also feel that I have grown in the design aspect because of the FamilyZone design project. I was also nervous with this because I had never done something like that, but I was able to work with the other intern and I loved working together and feeding off each other's creativity. It was a learning experience because we originally came up with idea one and then different problems came up that we had to change the ideas and to figure other ways to accomplish what we wanted. I am very excited to see this project get underway and then see it completed.

I have been VERY luck to have this wonderful, learning and growing experience. I have worked with many creative and very impressive people that have ideas come out of no where. I immensly enjoyed the time I had at Arizona Museum for Youth and it will always have a special place in my heart! When I finally have kids and they are older, I look forward to taking them to AMY and let them interact in a world that I was raised in and love.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Mission Possible: Communication

The opportunity I feel my organization could improve in is their communication. There are 11 employees at the Arizona Museum for Youth and they are all in a small area, but what they tend to have troubles with is their communications. Of course they have their different departments with different ideas and goals, what I have experienced is that they get stuck in that and don't bother to inform others of their goals and ideas and on going projects. For example, the FamilyZone that we are working on improving (which by the way we just got our proposal approved and we are working on getting it underway! Exciting!), my mentor (curator of education) decided that the area really needed fixing up so she assigned me and another intern to that project. So we started to design and get ideas, but when we all met as a staff to talk about what was going on, it turns that the marketing department already had an intern starting on that project. So of course we just joined forces, but still, they have their marketing ideas and we have our designing ideas.
Along with that, they were setting up for the next exhibit and the design team was working VERY hard to get it done. Well my mentor was working on getting the kid activities done for the same exhibit, but they didn't talk about both their goals and try to work some time out...they just decided that it was a great time do it and it was good in their schedules. Of course at that time (so close to the opening within hours) tempers flared because of the lack of communication and it did get done but with mintues left.
The museum is such a great place and they accomplish so much and have so much going on in their schedules with such a small staff list. I feel that if they were to start communicating between the different departments then things would happen better and smoother. The education department has a department meeting every week, the staff only has a meeting once a month if even that.
I will give credit to the Marketing Head because she just recently noticed the overlapping of projects and no communication and so she is now pushing for a weekly newsletter that will have the various projects going on and who is over seeing them.
If I were the boss, I would really support the weekly newsletter. I know that days can be busy and so there's not always time for weekly meetings, but the newsletter really would not take any more time out of their schedules and would actually save them time in stopping the project overlap.

Questioning the Mentor

I was able to sit down with my mentor (which was hard enough to find time since she is always running from one meeting to another) and had the chance to ask her questions.
I only had about five minutes so I chose just a few that I was really interested in learning.
The following is what I found out:

What types of challenges do you face?

budget cuts, and meeting deadlines since they are constantly changing exhibits every six months.

How do you deal with deadlines stress, difficult people and internal politics?

She said that she uses good sense of perspective that allows her to step back and see the bigger picture and to be thoughtful. Also with dealing with difficult people, she said that she usually tries to be diplomatic and use tact and patience and she also tries to consider the fact that people tend to react with emotion and react from that.

What do you like or dislike about your position?

The museum is dealing with budget cuts and so her answer included her frustration with that. She also said that she dislikes having to deal with staffing and the decisions that come with that area of management.

What is your ideal work environment?

She really enjoys the environment she's in which has mutual respect throughout the employees, one that allows creativity and problem solving, good communication and functioning teamwork, and lastly, one that allows flexibility whether she is working on the road, at home or in the office.

How has your education and experiences prepared you for your position?

While getting her BA, she was able to have a teaching position that taught her how to make lesson plans and to change the content according to the audience whether child or adult.

Lastly, Who do you most respect?

It was a three way tie for her.
Sr. David Attenborough and E.O. Wilson both for their great job of educating people about the natural world and what's really out there.
Ricky Gervais, a British comedian because humor is what keeps her going.

I have really enjoyed working directly with her and all that I have learned. I am very sad that my internship is coming to an end. I wish that I could continue in this position because she has her hands in everything and has something new everyday to learn or teach me. I have really appreciated Arizona Museum for Youth for the opportunity they have given me.

Make sure that you make a visit there...it's really worth seeing whether you are a child or not.